Fallen Earth | Book 2 | Aftermath

by Morrow, Jason D.

  “People always talk.”

  Sam turned his head away from him. He wasn’t ready to be tortured, and what would giving up the information benefit him? A quick death? Would he endure torture only to be killed?

  The question was, how much more damage to the country or to the world, could the Horsemen do? Sam wasn’t entirely sure how widespread the EMP blast had gone, but he knew there had been an intention to hit the entire United States. Whatever the plans were beyond that was a mystery to him. But if it was something great and terrible, did that mean Sam was the only person potentially stopping them from accomplishing their goals? If he were to somehow survive all this, he could figure out what was on the memory card and expose it to the world. Of course, he would need electricity and a means to expose it to the world, but obviously, Elias feared what Sam could do with the information. That meant he had some kind of power left in this struggle. He just didn’t know what it was yet.

  “Sometimes I don’t even need to torture the person to make them talk,” Elias continued. “Sometimes I can threaten to expose them, which would do nothing in this instance. Or I could use their family against them. That has usually proven successful.”

  Sam looked up at Elias, and he knew he shouldn’t have the moment he did it. Elias smiled, then walked to the door and opened it. Metal screeched against metal, and he said something to one of the guards in the hallway. Within a moment, the guards dragged another figure tied up at the wrists into the room.

  Sam’s jaw dropped and he almost couldn’t believe it.

  “This,” Elias said, “is your brother, correct?”

  Henry’s eyes met Sam’s and they both stared at each other in shock. It had been years since they had seen each other outside of prison. The last time Sam had seen his brother somewhere other than a courtroom or prison was…

  Guilt flooded through Sam.

  The moment Henry walked through the door, memories washed through him. It wasn’t as though the memories had been lost or even set aside because they visited him every single day. Each time he saw Henry, the memories became more vivid. They cut more deeply.

  Elias looked at them both. “This is going to be very interesting.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Sam didn’t want to go on the trip, but he had no other choice. Scott had spent the morning drinking and swearing at Sam’s mother about making them run behind, and going on and on about how this was going to be the best vacation they would ever have.

  Sam had been to the Wisconsin Dells before, and January wasn’t the time to do it. He was sure Scott had gotten a good deal on the trip considering the Dells was known as a wonderful summer getaway and it was currently snowing in sheets outside.

  Sam sat curled up in the back seat, watching as the trees went by. He checked his phone and was pleased to read a text from Henry saying he would be joining them for a day or two, if only to give Sam a distraction from Scott.

  Sam felt for the bruise under his eye, another reminder of how much he hated Scott and wanted him gone from his life. He looked up at his mom who was in the passenger seat looking at the trees passing by on the other side. She didn’t dare reach for the bruise under her eye. Scott would just tell her that her makeup was covering it up enough.

  When Sam looked at his mother, he saw a woman who was stuck. Someone who had been trapped by financial security, friends, and a nice house. She hadn’t always been this way. Sam remembered her being carefree and loving. He remembered when she used to smile. Sam wasn’t sure she had smiled any since marrying Scott. If so, it had certainly not been genuine.

  Sam felt for the knife in his pocket. It was small—about the size of his index finger when closed, but almost double that when it was opened.

  It was sharp.

  He had accidentally cut himself a couple of times when sharpening it, imagining what it would be like to slip it through Scott’s jugular vein.

  Sam didn’t have murder in him. He knew that. It would have to be done in a fit of rage. It would have to be when Scott was in the back room yelling at his mom, slapping her, hitting her. That’s when he could bring himself to do it. But he would have to be quick. He wouldn’t be able to overpower Scott. He would have to attack before Scott realized what was happening.

  He pulled his hand away and felt for his bruise again. He would never do it. He knew he would never do it.

  That night the entire cabin felt dark and alone, and Sam was nearly convinced that they were the only ones in the entire park. Scott cracked open another beer as he watched some twenty-four-hour news channel on the giant television in the living area. The only thing he liked more than drinking was swearing at the television and talking about the crazy socialists who were going to take over the country.

  Sam and his mom were playing cards at the kitchen table, keeping their voices low under the drumming of commentators trying to yell over one another.

  “I wish you would just leave him,” Sam said as he looked at his cards. He had broached the subject before, but his mom had dismissed him out of hand. He expected her to do so this time.

  “You know I can’t do that,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I love him,” she said. Her voice was flat as though she were saying a memorized line—something she was supposed to say.

  “I don’t believe that for a second,” he said.

  She didn’t answer.

  Sam knew his mom wasn’t guiltless in all of this. She should have left Scott years ago, but instead of trying to separate from her abuser, she found herself unconsciously trying to be more like him. She had taken up drinking years ago, though she never knocked back the kind of volume Scott could. She was also never physically abusive to Sam, though there had been occasions she had thrown insults at him just to appease Scott.

  Sam didn’t hold that against her. She wanted the approval of her husband. She was bound to him in some inexplicable way that Sam would never be able to understand. He just wished she loved her children more than this monster she had brought into their lives.

  “You know you want to escape him, mom.”

  “You shut your mouth,” she said, again emotionless. She played her next card and set it on the table in front of Sam. “You owe him your respect.”

  “I don’t owe him anything. I owe him a knife to the chest.”

  She looked up at him this time but didn’t say anything. She didn’t seem shocked, but she did watch him for a moment as if to study how serious he was.

  “You’ve changed,” Sam said. “Ever since Scott came into the picture. You didn’t use to do things like he does, but you do now.”

  She pursed her lips. “Like what?”

  “Like drinking. All the time.”

  “It’s social.”

  “It’s not social when you’re doing it right after breakfast in your car.”

  Her face flushed and she set all of her cards face down on the table in front of her. “I’ve stayed with him because I love him,” she insisted. “And you should respect him. I don’t like it when he hits you, but everybody has flaws. He’s just trying to show you how to grow up.”

  “That’s how I’m supposed to grow up? That’s how you want me to grow up?” Sam shook his head. “I’m grown up, mom. I don’t need someone to beat me into it. Just leave him.”

  She scooted the chair out from the table and stood. One of her hands balled into a fist over and over and she bit her lower lip as water filled her eyes, her lower lip trembling. “I…” She swallowed and pressed her chin against her chest and took a deep breath. When she looked up, her jaws clenched and her eyes narrowed at Sam. Then she walked across the kitchen and into the living area. It was as though Sam hadn’t said anything to her, or worse that she deliberately wanted to show him that he was wrong. She sat next to Scott, kissed him on the cheek, and took a drink of his beer.

  Sam threw down his cards and walked out into the cold night.

  The wind cut through his jacket, and the Wisco
nsin winter bit at his skin. He didn’t have enough clothes on for the winter night, but he couldn’t go back inside. Everything he hated was in that cabin.

  Headlights beamed across the woods and shined in his face until the car came to a stop about twenty feet away. The beams died and a figure got out of the car. Henry jumped out with his puffy jacket and slipped on his hat, then stomped through the snow toward Sam.

  “It’s too cold for you to be out here,” he said with a smile.

  “It’s too stuffy in there,” Sam said.

  “How you been?”

  “I’m done, Henry. I’m done.”

  Henry stood over him and Sam looked at his older brother, the light from inside the cabin casting an orange glow on his face.

  “Let’s leave,” Henry said with a shrug. “You don’t have to stay here. Hop in the car with me and we can head back home.”

  “You just got here.”

  “I don’t care. If there is anyone that understands the need to be away from Scott and Mom, it’s me.”

  Sam was about to take him up on the offer when the door to the cabin swung open and Scott stormed down the stairs.

  “What have you been saying to your mother?” Scott demanded. He stopped short of Sam, but Henry jumped between them and a sneer crossed Scott’s face.

  “Step back,” Henry said.

  Scott didn’t like a challenge and wasted no time shoving Henry back on his butt. Something awoke within Sam and he lunged forward, swinging his fists at Scott and hitting him in the face, chest, and stomach. Each punch drew blood around his knuckles, but Sam should have known that none of them would mean anything to a drunk man in a rage. His vision went white with a flash as Scott landed a punch on the side of his jaw.

  Sam felt cold as snow pressed into his face. His vision was dark, but he could hear the scuffle above him. Henry was an experienced fighter and wasn’t afraid of a drunk man who could hardly feel a punch.

  Sam pulled his head up out of the snow. Through the window he saw his mother screaming into the phone with tears running down her face.

  His eyes traveled to Scott and Henry. To Sam’s surprise, Henry was on his back and Scott straddled him and wailed on his face. Punch after punch, Henry was knocked out cold, but Scott wasn’t letting up. Sam felt for the knife in his pocket and got to his knees.

  Scott didn’t see him—his back was to Sam. All Sam could think was that Scott thought so little of him that he didn’t even consider him a threat.

  Sam glanced at the window again and saw his mom pacing on the other side of the room, unwilling to look out the window any longer. She was torn between two worlds: her sons and her husband. She could never choose for herself, so Sam would have to choose for her. He clenched his teeth and pulled open the knife. Scott brought down another fist.

  He had heard somewhere that there was honor in facing a man before you killed him, but Scott didn’t deserve honor.

  Sam’s fingers wrapped around the handle of the knife and he brought his hand up in the air. He leaned over the bent form of Scott and stabbed downward.

  He stabbed over and over and over and over, each plunge, deeper, wetter, warmer.

  Scott collapsed to the ground next to Henry, but Sam didn’t stop. He stabbed and stabbed and stabbed. His vision was black and red, foggy at the edges. Someone was screaming for him to stop, but louder was the blade against flesh. Blood soaked the snow. Each puncture repayment for a slap to Sam’s face, a kick to his ribs, or a curse to his mother.

  Someone pulled him away from the body and wrenched the knife from his hands. Henry’s voice screamed for him to stop, for him to breathe. For him to let go.

  It was over.

  Blood drenched his hands and clothes, and Henry immediately took him inside to clean him up, though he would barely remember that part later when the cops questioned him.

  The next few days would be a whirlwind that Sam would hardly be able to comprehend. He would later learn that Henry had been the one found with the knife when the police showed up later. He was the one who was arrested. Henry would decide to take the blame—admit to the murder while Sam remained in a daze for weeks. Henry would end up with a life sentence in Lone Oak State Prison.

  Sam would go free.

  The guilt Sam would feel over the next few years would have nothing to do with Scott’s death. That never was a factor when he felt like a terrible human being.

  He was in mental agony for the simple fact that he had allowed his brother to take the fall.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Alex and his crew did not put up a fight as Julie and her cronies tied them to chairs outside the hallway.

  Alex was just trying to avoid the bloodbath. He didn’t know what they were supposed to do about the prisoners stuck in their cells—the ones who had been there for two days already—but he didn’t think that executing them was right. They still lived in a country that had laws. Just because they were in a crisis didn’t mean they could do whatever they wanted.

  He tried saying this to Julie over and over but she wouldn’t even talk to him. Defenseless, Alex, Gwen, Bryson, and Trent waited for the executions to take place.

  They listened as Julie talked it over with her crew in the hallway. They had found a set of keys earlier that would allow them to open the cell doors. They were going to open each cell and fire blindly until whoever was inside was dead. They would have to do this about twenty times. Alex saw the flaw immediately. It would only take about two or three cells before the other prisoners realized what was going on. Then, they would reinforce the doors and hole up inside, or prepare themselves to lunge out at the executioners.

  “Listen to me,” Alex said. Julie looked up at him and bit the inside of her lip. She had no desire to talk with Alex. He was only a distraction from what they were trying to accomplish.

  “These prisoners aren’t dumb,” Alex said to her. “But they are desperate. One slip up and every single one of us is dead.”

  “And you think I’m the one being barbaric by trying to execute them?” Julie asked. “I’m trying to give them a quick death, a merciful death.”

  “You don’t even know what’s going on out there,” Gwen said. “We don’t even know if this power outage is temporary.”

  Julie shook her head. “The power isn’t coming back tomorrow. You know as well as I do that this is a long-term deal. There’s nothing we can do about it. Have you seen any crews working around the clock to restore power? It’s not like they can just go to some station and flip a switch. If the power was coming back on, we would’ve seen some semblance of that over the last couple of days.” She shook her head again. “Life as we knew it is over. The laws as we knew them are gone. It’s up to us to keep order and to survive. And sometimes it’s up to us to kill mercifully.”

  “So what does that mean you’re going to do with us?” Bryson said. “Because if you untie us we are just going to fight you. Are you going to mercy-kill us, too?”

  “I haven’t figured out what to do with you yet,” Julie said. “But if you give me enough of a reason, I will choose my life over yours. If that’s really what it comes down to.”

  Alex cleared his throat. “None of this is necessary. We aren’t here to fight you. We just came here to get some food and medicine, and we were going back. Just let us go back right now and we will all pretend this never happened.”

  Julie looked at her group, none of whom nodded or smiled or even shook their heads. “I don’t see a problem with any of that, so long as you let us do our job. Which, right now, means the execution of about twenty prisoners in that cell block. You of all people should understand the need to deal with these prisoners. You said you’re from Hope? Where do you think they’re going to go first if you let them go?”

  “You don’t know anything about these prisoners,” Alex said. “Just because they are here doesn’t mean they are murderers or that they deserve the death penalty. It also doesn’t mean that they don’t want to go see their famili
es or try a fresh start at a new life. Just because they are prisoners doesn’t mean that they’re going to be violent when they leave.”

  “And that’s where we differ philosophically,” Julie said. “Each of them has had an entire life of chances.”

  Alex didn’t see Julie as an opportunist, but merely someone who was paranoid and full of fear. That was a dangerous person to be up against. He knew there was no persuading her differently; it would only serve to reinforce her distrust of them. He watched as Julie and her group went into the cell block and closed the door behind them.

  “Honestly,” Trent said, “I’m not entirely sure she’s wrong.”

  The other three looked at Trent.

  “I mean, look at what everyone in Hope just went through. I’m actually surprised the three of you aren’t on board. I wasn’t there for the fight, but I sure saw the aftermath.”

  Gwen’s face burned red. “We were just trying to defend ourselves. We took back our town. We have no idea what these prisoners would’ve done.”

  “They would have done the same as the other prisoners,” Trent said.

  “You don’t know that,” Alex said.

  “I just don’t understand why we’re getting so uptight about it,” Trent said. “This is the kind of thing we should avoid and move on. We should just go look for some medicine and get back home.”

  Trent wasn’t necessarily wrong, but it still wasn’t right to execute the prisoners. This was not death row, and Alex was pretty sure that these prisoners weren’t lifers. It was a tossup as to whether or not they would be violent criminals. It was probably a mix.

  Perhaps it wasn’t their place to free them either, but from a human perspective, how could he let someone starve to death? That’s what would happen if they were left there. If this whole power outage thing was as big as they thought it was, leaving the inmates there was just as bad, if not worse, than killing them.

  Alex wished he would have struggled more so that the man who had tied him to this chair wouldn’t have done such a good job. He worked against the ropes, but they were tight.